IPA with not much going for it

[lukasfab]

brewed the following all cube hopped IPA and it doesn't have much flavour

BB Pale 4.8kg 88.89%
Dex .5kg 9.26%
caramunich .1kg 1.85%

Amarillo 42g
cascade 42g
centennial 52g
chinook 52g

brewmate says 62 ibu

SG 1.062 into FV at 21 lt, I maxi biab so the wort was around 1.080 in kettle then diluted in FV to 62

lost my hydro somewhere so only got brix reading 7, converting this says 1.007?? seems wrong??
pitched 2 packs of us05 @ 18deg

I have also added 50g mix of amarillo, centennial and simcoe to the keg
few days in the keg and it tastes bit sweet I think and virtually no aroma and taste wise isnt great
bitternes is down to in my opinion

should I be adding more hops to the keg?
or do a hop tea to get some bitternes and aroma back into it?

my first IPA so little pissed as to how it turned out

 

[Dan Pratt]

From what I understand the addition of the 500g of dextrose would reduce your FG lower than normal, so to me 1007 seems ok.

15.1 brix is 1062 - 7 brix 1007

http://onebeer.net/refractometer.shtml

The hops all used within the cube will give a IBU rating however they have not been used for 'bitterness'. Really the cube hop has created flavour and aroma, the aroma that is lacking as you mentioned, well I can only suggest that the 4 hop combo and the dry hop hasnt allowed for anyone hop to come through clean on the nose.

I recently made an IPA that turned out similar ( however only 5 days old since carbonation so early days ) with little to no Aroma punch. IFor a 20lt batch is used 45g steeped at 80c for 15 mins and then dry hopped another 45g for 3 days and end of fermentation.

Hops combo was even 3 ways with Simcoe, Warrior & Amarillo.

The hops that your adding, is it possible that have expired or gone stale?

 

[syl]

Do it again with the Chinook @ 60 (1.5gL) and the rest at flameout/cube. I am not sold on much utilisation in the cube at all even with no chill at all.

 

[lukasfab]

hops are not old by any means

yeah I don't think there was enough hops for just a cude addition

suggestion on fixing this one?

 

[boonchu]

If your are cubing straight from the boil ie no cooling at all, any hops added at 0 minutes or straight to the cube should generally be calculated as if added at 15 minutes. This is because isomerisation of the alpha acids occur down to 85*c.
The Amarillo and Centennial mix can combine to give a really sweet taste and may need more time to develop fully.

 

[Bizier]

Hop in the keg. I have taken up using two hop bags to catch all the crap from pellets. I will chuck a fair bit in there if I want, like 150g. Flowers are ace in the keg if you have access.

 

[anthonyUK]

I don't know what your water is like there but I had the same issues here in UK until I adjusted the water to suit a hoppy pale style.
I didn't have any hop aroma to speak of and the little that was there disappeared in a week or so.
My local water had a lot of residual alkalinity and treating this has made a massive difference.

 

[boonchu]

Thats a good call Anthonyuk try some calcium carbonate and calcium sulphate

 

[manticle]

Don't put caco3 in your ipa. Gypsum yes.
Use a bittering addition next time.

 

[timmi9191]

From your op, I assume you diluted your wort before you added your hops.
If so, this would have dropped the temp of your wort significantly.
The temp will mean little if any conversion of your hops to bitterness and flavour. What you have done is a massive dry hop.

 

[lukasfab]

diluted into FV not cube,
but it did sit for about 30min after boil end before going into cube

should I dry hop more? so far 50g has gone into keg

should I try a hop tea? how much, never done this one before

 

[anthonyUK]

I don't think more dry hops will help.
You already have a shed load in the batch so something is not right especially as the hops you have used would normally give massive amounts of aroma in a batch of that size.

 

[ricardo]

I don't know what your water is like there but I had the same issues here in UK until I adjusted the water to suit a hoppy pale style.
I didn't have any hop aroma to speak of and the little that was there disappeared in a week or so.
My local water had a lot of residual alkalinity and treating this has made a massive difference.

ditto, I also had a problem with the yeast I was using. I started using brewing salts and changed my yeast to one with high attenuation and all is good.

 

[lukasfab]

so after few days of keg hops this beer has actually come up ok
still lacking bitternes so will do the same and add hops at end of boil instead of cube to see how that goes
will mash at 65 instead of 66 as well

 

[BreathingHeat]

so after few days of keg hops this beer has actually come up ok
still lacking bitternes so will do the same and add hops at end of boil instead of cube to see how that goes
will mash at 65 instead of 66 as well

If you want proper bitterness in an IPA, do a 60 minute additional.